[Sca-cooks] newbee planning feast in winter, blog

Alex Clark alexbclark at pennswoods.net
Sat Jun 20 03:49:22 PDT 2009


<delurk>
> Our King is fond of meat, preferrably beef,
There is a recipe on p. 77 of the /Noble Boke off Cookry/ by Napier for 
"sauce aliper for rost bef". A more coherent version of the same recipe, 
without the comment about "rost bef" appears in Ashmole MS 1439, on p. 
108 of /Two Fifteenth Century Cookery-Books/ by Austin: "Sauce 
alepeuere.--Take fayre broun brede, toste hit, and stepe it in vinegre, 
and drawe it [th]urwe a straynour; and put [th]er-to garleke smal 
y-stampyd, poudre piper, salt, & serue forth."

In modern American English: Garlic-pepper sauce--Take fair brown bread, 
toast it, and steep it in vinegar, and draw it through a strainer, and 
put thereto garlic (stamped small), ground pepper, salt, and serve forth.

For boiled beef, the /Viandier/ calls for a similar sauce, but 
apparently with white bread, verjuice is used instead of vinegar, and 
pepper is omitted. BTW, "boiled beef" does not have to be boiled 
according to a modern definition; it may be what moderns call 
"simmered", or perhaps "braised".
> I have assembled a number of things that would have been available in 
> the beginning of winter. here is my list
> . . .
Don't forget pears, dried fava beans, various other nuts, and dried 
fruits such as raisins, figs, dates, etc.
> I wonder: was Fish *in season*, and what about eggs in winter
There were fish-days at any time of year, but fish was much more in 
season starting about February (Lent). Eggs were forbidden in Lent, 
depending on what period and place you're in; I suspect that they were 
hardly plentiful then, but couldn't guess about early December.

-- 
Henry of Maldon/Alex Clark



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